Adolescent drug abuse treatment research has made considerable progress over the past decade as a scientific and clinical specialty. Advances include the formulation of specialized multicomponent adolescent drug abuse treatment models which have been manualized and empirically tested. Researchers have also begun to explore moderators, processes, and mechanisms of effective adolescent drug abuse treatments. Moreover, widespread support exists among federal and private funding agencies for research on adolescent drug abuse treatment. This specialty's continued scientific maturation is predicated on its capacity to define the parameters and activities of empirically-based treatment development. At this time, the introduction and implementation of a framework for empirically based treatment development would facilitate researchers' efforts to develop and refine effective adolescent drug abuse treatments. To initiate steps toward importing a model for empirically based treatment development within this specialty, we propose an adolescent substance abuse treatment research conference (ASATRC). The primary purpose of the ASATRC would be to provide a forum for dialogue among specialists in adolescent drug abuse treatment research regarding empirically based treatment development. Through a series of presentations and panel discussions, the objectives of the ASATRC would be (a) to address the status and empirical basis of treatment development within the adolescent drug abuse treatment specialty, (b) to identify the major conclusions, the knowns and unknowns, pertaining to adolescent drug abuse treatment, (c) to specify unanswered empirical questions and points of controversy, which, if addressed successfully, would advance the state of the science of adolescent drug abuse treatment research, (d) to estimate the specialty's progress in developing a superordinate, empirically-oriented treatment development framework for adolescent drug abuse; and to articulate the components, processes and stages of possible treatment development frameworks for adolescent drug abuse, and (e) to form a network within which ongoing dialogue and collaboration may occur among adolescent drug abuse treatment researchers.
